ArtsQuest, which runs the SteelStacks entertainment campus in South Bethlehem, announced Tuesday a new paid-ticket outdoor summer concert series that eyes crowds of 3,000.

And ArtsQuest will kick off the series with a bang — chart-topping indie band Modest Mouse will play May 21.

But the new Yuengling Summer Concert Series at Levitt Pavilion SteelStacks, the stage at the base of the Bethlehem Steel blast furnaces, would seem to be direct competition for the busy Sands Bethlehem Event Center, which has a similar capacity and is just a quarter-mile away.

The Modest Mouse concert will come amid the event center's busy May anniversary month, when it has 26 events booked. It has a private event scheduled for May 21.

But ArtsQuest and Sands officials said they believe the outdoor series and event center can co-exist.

"We really see this series as complementing the great concerts and experiences that are already being offered in South Bethlehem," ArtsQuest Vice President of Programming Patrick Brogan said. "From the beginning, the intent of programming at SteelStacks has been to fill existing programming holes in the Lehigh Valley arts and cultural scene.

"During the warm-weather months, many people really enjoying being outside, and SteelStacks offers a pretty unique backdrop to see an outdoor show, making for a different type of concert experience, and one we hope fans will love."

Event center General Manager Matt Salkowski said he views it the same way.

"I think it's great for the Lehigh Valley, and it's great for all the attractions in south Bethlehem," Salkowski said.

He believes such concerts will also drive patrons to Sands Casino Resort Bethlehem and, eventually, to event center shows.

"It's not competition; it's just taking advantage of the demographic and offering something, with outdoor shows, that we can't. We have a great relationship with the people at ArtsQuest, and we want them to succeed just as much as they want to see us succeed."

Salkowski said ArtsQuest did not discuss the new series with event center personnel.

When SteelStacks was in its formative years, ArtsQuest planned an indoor venue for 2,500 to 3,500 people, but abandoned it as duplicative when the event center was announced. Musikfest Cafe at SteelStacks handles just over 500 for a seated show and 1,000 for a standing show.

The Sands Bethlehem Event Center has a 3,500-person capacity for standing shows and 2,250 for seated shows.

ArtsQuest did not say how many concerts would be in the new series. They will be separate from the free Levitt Pavilion Summer Concert Series, which presents 50 free concerts from Memorial Day weekend through mid-September. Those concerts will be announced soon, Brogan said.

The area has been gated for concerts before: ArtsQuest's first Blast Furnace Blues, RiverJazz and SteelJam festivals in 2011 included the gated Levitt stage. They became exclusively indoor festivals when outdoor attendance didn't meet expectations, and SteelJam was discontinued.

Last May, the MDA Ride For Life event offered a paid concert by rocker Joan Jett that drew about 2,500.

"The Levitt Pavilion," Brogan said, "is booked up Thursday to Saturday nights with its annual tremendous free-to-the-public summer series. … It plays host to Americaplatz during Musikfest, and is host of a number of other events throughout the summer. We're trying to be opportunistic on a handful of summer nights to bring acts that fill voids in the region's programming and are coming through the area."

Brogan said, "We're honored that an electrifying group like Modest Mouse will be the initial act in this exciting, new series."

But it also shouldn’t be ignored that the Levitt series will come during and already-crowded summer season.

In addition to the Sands shows, there also will be music –free music – at Allentown’s Mayfair festival, which has a low-cost admission. Mayfair has not announced its acts – last year, it had regional bands headlined by pop group Sandlot Heroes.

Mayfair starts just tow days after the Modest Mouse concert.

But Modest Mouse is definitely a grab for ArtsQuest.

The four-man band from Washington state had a platinum album in 2004 with "Good News for People who Love Bad News," then saw its 2007 album "We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank" debut at No. 1 and go gold.

The group topped the Modern Rock chart in 2004 with the song "Float On," which went gold, and had two other Top 10 songs on that chart with 2004's "Ocean Breathes Salty" and 2007's "Dashboard."

"Good News for People Who Love Bad News" was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Alternative Rock Album and "Float On" also got a Grammy nomination.

"We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank" was the group's last full album. Its last release was a 2009 EP, "No One's First and You're Next." Band members have said they are writing and recording material for a new disc, but no release date has been set.

ArtsQuest has had mixed success with indie-rock acts before. It offered Young The Giant and MGMT at Musikfest in 2011, drawing 3,211 and 4,800 people, respectively. Those were relatively small crowds for Musikfest's then-7,200 main stage capacity, but would be sell-outs for the Levitt Pavilion shows.

ArtsQuest also had an indie-rock festival called Nowadays at ArtsQuest Center in 2012, offering smaller and lesser-known acts, but it did not sell well and was not held for a second year.

"One of the primary goals of the new Yuengling Summer Concert Series at SteelStacks is to present artists from music genres that definitely exhibit room for growth in our region, such as indie rock acts and jam bands," Brogan said. "Not only is this an opportunity to present some artists who rarely, if ever, perform in our region, it's a great way to attract new audiences to the Lehigh Valley and hopefully introduce them to all of South Bethlehem's attractions."

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JOHN J. MOSER has been around long enough to have seen the original Ramones in a small club in New Jersey, U2 from the fourth row of a theater and Bob Dylan's born-again tours. But he also has the number for All-American Rejects' Nick Wheeler on his cell phone, wrote the first story ever done on Jack's Mannequin and hung out in Wiz Khalifa's hotel room.

OTHER CONTRIBUTORS

JODI DUCKETT: As The Morning Call's assistant features editor responsible for entertainment, she spends a lot of time surveying the music landscape and sizing up the Valley's festivals and club scene. She's no expert, but enjoys it all — especially artists who resonated in her younger years, such as Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, Tracy Chapman, Santana and Joni Mitchell.

KATHY LAUER-WILLIAMS enjoys all types of music, from roots rock and folk to classical and opera. Music has been a constant backdrop to her life since she first sat on the steps listening to her mother’s Broadway LPs when she was 2. Since becoming a mother herself, she has become well-versed on the growing genre of kindie rock and, with her son in tow, can boast she has seen a majority of the current kid’s performers from Dan Zanes to They Might Be Giants.

STEPHANIE SIGAFOOS: A Jersey native raised in Northeast PA, she was reared in a house littered with 8-tracks, 45s and cassette tapes of The Beatles, Elvis, Meatloaf and Billy Joel. She also grew up on the sounds of Reba McEntire, Garth Brooks and Tim McGraw and can be found traversing the countryside in search of the sounds of a steel guitar. A fan of today's 'new country,' she digs mainstream/country-pop crossovers like Lady Antebellum and Sugarland and other artists that illustrate the genre's diversity.